1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to generating an electronic form, and more specifically to generating an electronic form locally on a client computer from input parameters.
2. Description of the Related Art
An electronic form is utilized to obtain information from an end-user at a client computer via a keyboard, a touchscreen, or voice. The electronic form can elicit a variety of information such as username and password login information, address information, payment information, registration information, product information, customer feedback for a product survey, job applicant information for an employment application, or even prospective student information to complete an application for admission to a university.
It is known for a client computer having a web browser and display to send a request to a server computer to obtain an electronic form for display at the client computer, and for entry of information by the end-user. To send the request, an end-user can select an object or URL on a web page, scan a barcode having a uniform resource locator (URL), or enter a URL that contains an address of the electronic form into the web browser. Selection, scanning, or entry of a URL initiates a request that is transmitted from the client computer, through a network, and then to a server computer that stores the electronic form. Subsequently, the server computer, in response to the request, generates electronic form information and transmits that information through the network to the client computer. The electronic form information may be defined in an HTML document. The web browser of the client computer then parses the electronic form information in order to display the electronic form to the end-user. Thus, the known approach requires that the client computer have network connectivity in order to send the request to the server computer and receive the information needed to display the electronic form to the end-user. Moreover, requiring the client computer to send the request to the server computer and receive the information needed to display the electronic form from the server computer, causes delays in obtaining the electronic form for display on the client computer.
Furthermore, it is also known to cache at the client computer web pages and other documents received from a server computer, for subsequent use at the client computer. However, the challenge of reducing the amount of time required to display an electronic form on a client computer continues to persist.